Five steps to …Keeping control of your travellers’ dining expenses

They may not amount to as much as a flight or a hotel room, but food and drink still account for a significant proportion of the cost of every business trip – typically 18-21 per cent, according to the corporate travel booking platform Engine.

What is more, costs are rising fast. We all know from personal experience that the price of dining out has rocketed since the beginning of the decade.

But travellers’ food and drink expenses are hard for any business to manage. Flights and hotels are booked and even paid for in advance – meals generally are not, making the cost more difficult to track. Even so, there are several improvements you can introduce into your travel programme which will help you gain more control over this this tricky spend category.

Step 1 – Write clear food and beverage rules into your travel policy

Set limits for how much travellers can spend on breakfast, lunch and dinner. Make sure the spend caps are varied appropriately for different parts of the world: a dinner in Paris costs much more than one in Jakarta for example. Keep these limits constantly under review to maintain pace with inflation.

Set rules as well on the use of hotel mini-bars and room service. Room service can make dining more expensive but remember that some business travellers, such as solo females, may feel uncomfortable eating alone in a restaurant.

Step 2 – Find the right payment method

You will find it easier to track food and beverage purchases if you issue corporate cards to your travellers. It means you can look directly at their payment data. Another option to consider is virtual cards, which can be issued for use only with one specified merchant and with a cap on spend.

Step 3 – Use technology to improve the process

Digitised tools can speed up the expense reporting process for your travellers (for example by photographing receipts for instant upload) and increase your visibility of spend. Digital expense systems can also run automated checks on policy compliance.

Step 4 – Make sure travellers collect receipts

Tell travellers they must collect and submit an itemised receipt from restaurants where they dine, to including the establishment’s name, addresss, date and tax number. A full receipt allows you to verify that the traveller’s meal expenditure aligns with company rules and is also essential for tax reclaim purposes.

Step 5 – Consider negotiating meal discounts

Analyse expense data to see whether your travellers are heavy users of any particular restaurants, either within the hotels where they are staying or at other locations. If some restaurants are used repeatedly, there may be an opportunity to negotiate a better price with them – for example a special rate with a hotel that is inclusive of dinner, bed and breakfast.